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10..9..8..7..6..5..4..3..2..1..1..Happy new year!

2008

It's that time of year when New Year is upon us, those in Scotland are celebrating Hogmanay, and many other people are feeling smug in the world having already celebrated new year (Hi, Andrew!). And yet, just when you thought 2008 couldn't get any worse, it's been extended an extra second. We had a leap second added a couple of years ago, and we're due another one now. Technically, it's only those in GMT (or those trailing timezones) whose 2008 is being extended; for those ahead of GMT, it'll be a longer 2009.

It seems that the last year a leap second was added, we had Sam; and now, when a leap second was added, we had Holly. Let's hope we don't make a habit of this.

Note to pedants: you only get the 3..2..1..1..Happy new year! countdown in GMT timezones. The leap second is added globally at the same instant, so NYC will see it at 18:59:59..18:59:60..19:00:00.

If you want to find out more about it, then you can read the wikipedia entry or my 2005 blog post on the subject.